Colton having the best of everything had more or less panned out for them, and they lit up the second generator until Hamish, a handier electrician than his huge meaty fingers would suggest, managed to change out the plug. But there was no doubt. The sculpture was going to have to get wired into the council main if they weren’t to blow the fuse for the entire island.
“What’s it going to look like?” said Innes. “A disco?”
“How much wattage does it suck up?” said Charlie.
Konstantin looked absolutely blank. He had totally no clue what they were talking about.
So the next day, while Saif was heading to Glasgow, Innes had gone down and had a word with Bert the Councilman, or, to be more specific, took a couple of very good fat hens down to Bert the Councilman, which isn’t to say Bert wouldn’t have been immediately amenable but is to say it might have cut through a bit of the red tape involved in waiting for the next council meeting, and a debate, and having to deal with Malcy, which nobody liked if they didn’t have to, and sure enough, Bert lent them the skeleton key to open the supply on the promise that they’d do it carefully in the dark and not tell anyone, and that only Hamish would do it, and that if they all killed themselves they weren’t to come running to him, and Flora was furious because Innes had nicked two of the best layers and the demand for eggs in the Seaside Kitchen and the Rock combined was absolutely massive—didn’t he ever think?—and Innes looked defiant and very like Agot, whereas Hamish hung his head, but it didn’t matter, it was too late now, and this Big Special Project better be very worth it, said Flora.
The boys could hardly wait until dark, though. They even (and Flora rolled her eyes like you wouldn’t believe) got all togged up in balaclavas and scarves over their faces. She pealed with laughter when she saw Joel with his best Burberry cashmere pulled up.
“You are kidding. This isn’t a heist.”
“Legally,” said Joel in his studied way, “it absolutely is a heist. We’re hacking into the council electricity supply.”
Flora frowned. “If you get killed, I will absolutely kill you.”
“Roger that,” said Joel, looking at her, and she laughed again and kissed him full-on.
“What was that for?” said Joel, confused.
“Joel Booker, since I have known you, I have loved everything about you. But I don’t think I’ve ever seen you have much fun.”
Joel frowned. “Except . . .”
“Yes, except for that,” said Flora. “But there is more than one type of fun.”
“It’s freezing out there and I might get electrocuted,” said Joel.
“Yeah,” said Flora. “But you’re still having fun.”
Saif had stared at the pictures for a long time. He hadn’t been able to believe what he was seeing. It didn’t make any sense at all; he felt like his brain was broken. A part of him thought if he could shut his eyes, if he could close everything off, then this would go away. He could unravel everything, travel backward in time, leave this country, go home, start over. A cold sweat crept over him as he remembered Amena suddenly, caught a glimpse, could almost smell the familiar scent of bougainvillea, traffic fumes in the warm night, cooking from the other apartments across the courtyard where they lived, the air heavy and orange; remembered her walking Ibrahim up and down, singing Arabic lullabies to his baby.
The person in this picture . . . He stared and stared.
It was Amena, yes. It was her. He couldn’t deny it. But it couldn’t be. The picture was of her looking straight ahead, staring into the camera. She looked older, but her beautiful eyes were still just like Ash’s, the long eyelashes flicking off toward the sides; mother and son were so very similar.
But this woman . . . who was and was not Amena. She had her arm through another man’s. On her left hand glinted a wedding ring, and it was not the ring of coiled silver that Saif had given her, had brought from Beirut, bought on a medical student’s meager salary. This was a thick dull band that could have been gold or could have been a brass curtain ring for all he could tell.
And underneath her long traditional robes, far more conservative than anything she had ever worn when they had been together, was the round swell of a pregnant belly.
He pushed the photograph away.
“No,” he said. “It’s not her.”
“Are you sure?” said the commander persistently. “Take another look. It’s not like last time, when we simply didn’t know. We have good intelligence that this is who she is.”
Saif could barely lift his shaggy head, couldn’t let his tear-filled eyes even focus on the picture.
“I do not understand what this means,” he croaked.
Quietly, the man placed another picture on the table. She was there again, but this time standing next to someone: a man with a large mustache and a small beard. He was dressed plainly in a thobe but he had a large gun and a sword hanging from his belt.
“This is from a little earlier,” said the man. “We believe . . . We think that it’s a wedding photo.”
Saif stared at her face.
“But she is already married,” he said numbly. Neda put a comforting hand on his shoulder.
“There are forced marriages,” she said. “You understand this?”
But Saif was staring at the wedding photo. The woman in the picture was smiling.
TEA WAS BROUGHT and the situation outlined, although he could hardly take it in, none of it. It appeared that Amena Hussein, née Abboud, had remarried a Syrian freedom fighter two years after the disappearance of her husband and sons.
Which led to many problems. Not least of which whom the freedom fighter was believed to be fighting for.
“We cannot . . . In the situation it would be extremely difficult to extricate her to the UK. In the current political climate . . . I’m afraid it could get extremely awkward.”
Saif looked up and stared straight into the officer’s eyes. The man was not unkind, he knew. This was a profoundly bitter truth.
“She. Is. Not. A Daesh. Bride,” he said, as carefully and calmly as he could manage.
The man merely nodded.
“And her two sons are here. You would deny her her sons?”
Again the man did not speak. Then: “If you can make a positive identification—”
“What?”
Saif’s eyes were brimming over with misery. His first thought was could he go back, find her? But what was there to go back to? The war wasn’t over. Who knew what kind of hellscape was happening in Damascus. Who knew what effect it would have on his children, his entire world. How could he pull them out of their wonderful environment, their fabulous school, and, most important of all, most important, more important than anything in the world, their safety?
Mure might be small, chilly, out of the way.
But oh my goodness, it was so safe. Nobody would be harmed. Nobody would be pulled out of bed by soldiers; there weren’t any, unless you counted the occasional Russian nuclear submariners who secretly resurfaced from time to time and emptied the grocers of vodka, but Saif didn’t, seeing as they weren’t meant to be there at all, and when they were there, all they wanted to do was drink vodka and chat up the café girls.
His children were safe. What could be more important than that?
Well. Their mother. Seeing their mother. What child would not brave the whole world to be in his mother’s arms?
But what if there was another baby already in her arms?